DORASAN, South Korea, Sept. 18 (UPI) -- The heavily armed buffer zone that has divided North Korea and South Korea for the past half century was opened Wednesday in groundbreaking ceremonies for the establishment of cross-border rail and road links.
With colorful fireworks exploding and hundreds of balloons floating skyward, soldiers opened a metal gate in the fence that runs 155 miles along the Demilitarized Zone and has separated the two Koreas since their war in the early 1950s.
Some 1,000 dignitaries who gathered at a border area 25 miles northwest of Seoul applauded as a boy and girl representing North and South Korea came from each side of the fence and linked hands, while a chorus sang the song "Our wish is unification," popular on both sides of the sealed border. A two-train car blew a whistle and moved 15 yards to the severed site of the railway.
"Today we are standing at the start of a new era during which the South and the North will move forward hand in hand toward the future," South Korea's Acting Prime Minister Kim Suk-soo said in an address. "We are burying a history marked by the scars of war and the pain of division."
"I hope this train will take me to my hometown in the North," said Lee Keun-yop, 80, who said some of his relatives may still alive there.
A ceremony was also held on the eastern tip of the buffer zone to reconnect a separated railway and road on the east coast.
At the same time North Korea launched two ceremonies on the northern side of the Demilitarized Zone. North Korean Prime Minister Hong Song Nam led a ceremony attended by some 3,000 people, officials said.
Under a summit agreement in 2000, the leaders of the two Koreas have pushed for the reconnection of the severed railways and roads as a symbolic project for reconciliation between the two Cold War rivals.
For the rail and road link, the two sides must open a corridor in the 2.5-mile wide Demilitarized Zone, one of the world's most heavily fortified borders. More than a million mines are believed to be planted in the no man's land, including some 3,000 in the area where the railway is being rebuilt.
Soldiers are to start clearing mines from Thursday following a military accord the two sides signed Tuesday to ensure the safety of soldiers who will walk into the DMZ. If plans go smoothly, cross-border railways and roads will be re-linked by year's end.
South Korean President Kim Dae-jung said the rail and road links would promote cross-border trade and exchanges, and eventually link to Russia's trans-Siberian railway, through which his country could deliver products to Europe, a major export market.
The railway will reconnect the two Korean capitals and go on to Shinuiju, a major city on the North Korea's border with China. However, the two Koreas technically remain in a state of war as the 1950-53 Korean War ended without a peace treaty.
In a message to the two Korean leaders, Russian President Vladimir Putin said the project would strengthen peace and security in Korea and in the Asia-Pacific region. "Russia is deeply satisfied with this significant and symbolic step -- reconstruction of vital routes, connecting two Korean states," Putin was quoted as saying.
